The most recent Bush Administration’s record on identifying and protecting endangered species was pretty dismal, only 62 species were listed in the eight years of Bush’s term. That contrasts with the previous two administrations, Clinton and George H.W. Bush, each of whom added about that many species to the list every year.

The Obama Administration came in to power talking about cleaning up the policies of the Bush Administration, particularly when it came to outdoors and environmental issues. So it might be expected that species added to the list would be trending back towards the numbers of the Clinton and first Bush years. Guess again.

The Obama administration Friday issued its first review of species that are candidates for protection as endangered species, identifying a total of 249 species in need of protection. The review also describes the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s progress in listing these species, showing that the administration has, to date, only listed one species - a Hawaiian plant reduced to a handful of individuals.

That’s right, after nearly a year under Obama, the Fish & Wildlife Service has added one, count ‘em, one, name to the Endangered Species List. That doesn’t even come close to matching the pace of the Bush years, much less the two presidents before him.

Whatever the reason, for the delay, there are more than a few candidates for the list right now. Every year’s delay means it’s that more likely that some of these species won’t make it.

The 249 candidates include a wide variety of species, from shorebirds such as the red knot, which migrates along the Atlantic Coast during one of the longest migrations in the animal world, to the aboriginal pricklyapple, a cactus found in Florida, to the Pacific fisher, a relative of the mink and otter that is dependent on old-growth forests on the West Coast. Being designated as a candidate does not provide any formal protection to the 249 species, a number of which have been waiting for protection for almost as long as the Endangered Species Act has existed. On average, the candidates have been waiting 20 years for protection.

The current review includes eight new species since the last review: Florida bonneted bat, yellow-billed loon, roundtail chub, diamond darter, rabbitsfoot clam, Goose Creek milkvetch, Kentucky gladecress, and Florida bristle fern. Four species were removed, including the fat-whorled pondsnail, troglobitic groundwater shrimp, and two plants, Calliandra locoensis and Calyptranthes estremerae.